Counterparts
by HereThereBeFic
Summary: After the events of "Mirror, Mirror," members of the landing party need a bit of reassurance about certain shipmates. Turns a bit Bones-centric towards the end, because if the show's not going to deal with what happened to him, someone has to. Language.


Kirk chatted with Marlena for about ten minutes before sending her on her way to get on with her tasks. She really was a nice girl. Any guilt he'd felt at leaving her counterpart behind in the parallel universe was nullified by the thought that the two would probably have switched places during the transport. It had been strange and terrible enough attempting to fit into that world for a few hours - he wouldn't wish a lifetime of it on anybody.

Marlena left the bridge, and Kirk retook his seat. He found himself staring at the young Russian navigating at the helm. He shook his head to clear it of the image of Chekov's face, first smirking in depraved triumph and then contorted in agony.

Chekov looked over at Sulu and said something Kirk didn't catch. They both laughed. The captain smiled and returned his attention to his duties.

* * *

Uhura bit the inside of her mouth when she realized she'd just unconsciously reached for her boot to snatch up a knife she didn't have - again. Sulu looked puzzled.

"Uhura? Something wrong?"

She shook her head. It had been two days, and she was still jumpy around him. It was time to get over it: _he_ hadn't done anything wrong.

"No, sorry. What were you saying?"

"That plant you were asking me about - it bloomed about an hour ago; I was wondering if you still wanted to see it."

She smiled. "Yes, I'd like that. Thank you."

* * *

Mr. Scott was always an interesting and amusing conversationalist, and Mr. Kyle was pleasantly surprised, if a bit confused, when the Chief Engineer requested his help with repair efforts and spent the resulting next half-hour chatting with him over a most definitely _not_ damaged transporter console.

Scotty was just happy to hear the man _talk_ instead of scream, and was glad to sleep that night without images of the agonizer haunting his dreams.

* * *

McCoy tapped his fingers on the desk's surface, eyes following Spock as he sat across from him. "You're sure about this, Spock?"

"Doctor, you have requested my reassurance on this matter five times, and every time I have given it. I am quite certain. It is the only way to repair any damage my... counterpart may have inflicted. Are you ready?"

McCoy gave him a wry grin. "As ready as I'll ever be, I guess. Go ahead."

The doctor shivered slightly, closing his eyes as Spock's fingers touched his face, moving lightly into the proper position. He'd had his eyes open on that other _Enterprise._ It had somehow made things infinitely worse.

Spock initiated the meld, and McCoy sat up straighter, feeling a hand on his wrist that he knew wasn't there and anticipating a wall he knew he wouldn't be backed up against.

It soon became evident, however, that this time would be completely different. Spock did not force his way into the corners of McCoy's mind like his doppelgänger had. He paused before each action, waiting for McCoy's permission before moving on to new areas of thought and memory. The mental touch was light, almost non-existent, as it gently put the doctor's mind back in order and calmed the not-quite-unconscious fears and uncertainties that had arisen after the initial meld -

Then everything went wrong. McCoy felt as though he'd been sent tumbling from a great height without warning. Memories and thoughts that he'd done his best to suppress or simply live with now crowded to the forefront of his mind. He gasped, overwhelmed, and jerked away from Spock's touch - but the vulcan had evidently anticipated this move, for there was suddenly another hand at the back of McCoy's head, gently but firmly keeping him in place. The thoughts and memories receded, slowly, slowly, _too damn slowly,_ and McCoy realized dimly that he was shaking.

And then it was over. McCoy opened his eyes, breathing hard and staring blankly at the vulcan in front of him. Spock looked as close to concerned as McCoy ever expected to see him, save perhaps on his deathbed.

"Doctor. I must apologize. I would have given you better warning beforehand, but I..." He paused, and somewhere in the back of his mind McCoy inwardly smirked at having left him lost for words. "... I did not expect to find so much pain concealed within you."

"It wasn't concealed," McCoy said irritably. His voice was uneven. _Dammit._ "It was _dealt with._ And I didn't much feel like dealing with it again." He swallowed, ducking his head and pressing his palms against his eyes. _**Damn**__ it._

"I assure you, Doctor, it was not my intention to cause you any further suffering. But your memories had been disturbed in the previous meld, and I could not ignore that. I also could not differentiate between those which had been affected and those which hadn't. It would have required my discovering at least the most basic details of each one, and I assumed that you would wish for privacy rather than efficiency."

"Well, thank you for that," McCoy muttered, making an effort not to sound sarcastic.

"Of course, doctor. The logical thing was to simply deal with all of the memories at once. Unfortunately, however, a side effect of any meld dealing with memories is that those memories are brought to the surface. I regret the pain this apparently caused you."

"It's all right, Spock." McCoy didn't remove his hands from his eyes. A thought occurred to him. "But why was it only the bad memories?"

There was a pause. Then,

"That... was due to nothing but cruelty on the part of my parallel."

McCoy finally looked up. "What?"

"He evidently... took pleasure in causing you pain, and deliberately tampered with the parts of your mind which house unpleasant thoughts and memories. That much I could tell without examining them closely, and so I focused only on those."

McCoy was shaking again. "He... did it on purpose? It was... He..."

The memories were coming back - they hadn't really gone, only retreated to a safe distance, and now that they saw his mind was vulnerable they renewed their attack.

_He was in a hospital room, forcing himself to remain calm and collected while his father begged him for death over and over again._

_He was pacing in the hallway, ignoring the hospital staff and the shakiness of his stride as his mind reeled with the weight of the action he was considering._

_He was giving in, flipping the switch and watching his father die, telling the panicked doctors who rushed into the room that he didn't know what had happened, going home and staring at the wall for an hour in an effort to avoid thinking._

_He was running blindly from the doctor who had just told him of the miracle cure, tears burning his cheeks as he slammed the door of the first enclosed space he could find, never mind that it was a closet in the middle of a crowded hallway, and slid to the floor with his head in his arms._

"Doctor, are you all right?" Spock's voice sounded muffled and distorted, and McCoy barely registered it.

_He was in his own kitchen, shouting at the woman he loved, but not nearly as loudly as she was shouting at him._

_He was biting back a curse and chasing after the little girl who had just run sobbing from the room, catching her and trying to tell her that everything was all right - she didn't believe him; she'd seen her parents fight too often, been told too many times that it wouldn't happen again, and watched too many times as it did to believe him._

_He was hugging his daughter goodbye, holding on as long as he could without missing his shuttle, wiping her tears away when he pulled back and smiling at her with a braveness he hadn't felt since realizing how little he'd get to see of her now._

"Doctor McCoy!"

_He was on an _Enterprise_ that was sickeningly familiar but completely different, pressing himself against a cold wall and trying to make himself as small as possible as a monster with his friend's face invaded his mind, roughly kicking aside thoughts and knowledge that he didn't need._

_He was in his quarters, lying on his bed with his eyes open and willing himself to believe that he was acting foolish and there was nothing to be upset about._

_He was trying to figure out whether he felt relieved or terrified as Spock told him there was._

"Spock to Captain Kirk; request your presence in sickbay."

_He was standing over a dead man, blood soaking his hands and his shirt and the sheets - and another, splayed out on the ground, limbs at unnatural angles - and another, face frozen and contorted in pain - and another -_

"Bones..."

_- staring up at him with unseeing eyes as the grip on his wrist suddenly went limp -_

"Bones."

_- and two dozen more, scattered around the deathly silent sickbay, full of moaning and screaming mere moments before -_

"Bones!"

He snapped back into awareness to find the captain staring at him with blatant worry, gripping his shoulders tightly.

"Jim?" At some point he'd abandoned his chair and backed himself up against one of the beds. Jim was kneeling on the floor beside him.

He shook him lightly. "It's all right, Bones; come out of it."

McCoy gulped, bringing one hand up and pressing it against his forehead as he gasped for breath. "I don't..." His voice was cracking. Jim shook him again.

"Look at me, Bones; it's all right."

McCoy looked up and an instant later found himself clinging to his best friend and captain, trying in vain to stop himself from sobbing into his shirt.

Kirk had very little idea as to what he was actually doing. He held onto McCoy tightly, glancing up at Spock with a million questions in his eyes. Spock answered the most obvious one first.

"He will be all right. It is simply one of the more unfortunate effects of a meld."

"A meld? Why were you performing a meld?"

"To reverse any harm my counterpart might have caused."

Jim stared at him. "Your...? What did he do?"

Spock looked at him with the subdued, vulcan equivalent of surprise. "I had assumed the doctor had informed you already. While you were trapped in the parallel universe, my counterpart..." Spock trailed off, looking uncharacteristically hesitant.

Kirk was currently holding onto the sobbing wreck that was his normally sturdy and stalwart CMO and had very little patience for hesitant vulcans, whoever they may be.

"He _what,_ Spock?"

"He forced a mind-meld on Doctor McCoy."

Jim's eyes widened, and he looked down at the doctor in horror. "He forced... Spock, please tell me I'm wrong in my assumption of how serious that is."

Spock shook his head. "It is extremely serious, Captain, as I have informed the doctor. It is the worst kind of violation a vulcan can commit, and many non-telepathic victims of such a meld go mad within the first hour of the attack. Doctor McCoy's current state is not nearly as serious as it could be. He has a remarkably strong mind."

McCoy had been steadily regaining his composure throughout Spock's explanation, and now he gave a snort of half-hysterical laughter. "That's the closest thing to a compliment I'll probably ever get from you, Spock."

Spock raised an eyebrow. "A strong mind," he repeated, "though of course a highly illogical one."

"Of course, Mr. Spock," McCoy muttered, slowly letting go of Jim's shirt where he had been clutching it tightly enough to hurt his fingers.

Jim couldn't help but grin fondly at the two of them. "You all right, Bones?"

"Oh, my pride's been brutally murdered, but the rest of me will live."

Jim smiled, getting to his feet and offering the good doctor a hand. "Good. Then go get some rest. You've been on edge for the past week."

Bones gave him an amused look and accepted the hand up. "Is that an order, Captain?"

"Yes it is, Doctor. And I have another one: you are not to engage in any arguments with Mr. Spock until you are restored to full health and can provide sufficient amusement for the bridge crew with your quarreling."

"That one might be more difficult, Jim, but I suppose I can just take it as an extra incentive to recover quickly."

The routine jokes and bickering were not the end of the matter, but the three of them could pretend for now that they were. That Kirk wouldn't find excuses to hang around sickbay more often for the next week. That Spock wouldn't rise to the bait more often and easily in the doctor-versus-science officer arguments that told the bridge crew everything was right with the world. That McCoy wouldn't be on the bridge when the captain wasn't in sickbay.

They could pretend, and they could pretend they didn't realize it.


End file.
